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Ross seeks support for Freetac, Free Trade.

Article Excerpt
Editor's note: Wilbur L. Ross Jr., chairman of International Steel Group, was the keynote speaker for the Association of Iron and Steel Engineers' Annual President's Breakfast Sept. 30. His remarks seek support for a new group called the Free Trade for America Coalition--Freetac--which brings together management and labor from a wide range of industrial and agri-businesses to fight unfair trade. Following is an excerpt of his presentation.

Contrasting the career development of an engineer and that of a Wall Streeter, it seems that as an engineer progresses, he becomes increasingly specialized, so he learns more and more about less and less until he knows virtually everything about almost nothing. The Wall Streeter gets to know less and less about more and more subjects until eventually he knows virtually nothing about practically everything. I would say I am pretty close to knowing nothing about everything, but I shall try to marshal a few important facts about our international trade situation.

* Fact #1: Until 1997, the U.S. balance of payments deficit was less than $200 billion per year, an affordable amount.

* Fact #2: Since 1997, our trade deficit (the amount of product sold into the U.S. by foreigners minus the amount we sell abroad) has more than doubled...

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